Charlie Shreck undermined Durham's fight-back at Chester-le-Street on the opening day of the first county championship home game of the season.

The Cornishman took two quick wickets just before rain ended play with the hosts on 175 for five after 53 overs of the Division Two match.

In his second season with Nottinghamshire, Shreck was included because former Durham target Ryan Sidebottom has not fully recovered from a back problem and took three for 61 in 17 overs. All his victims were left-handers, beaten on the front foot by balls moving into them. The first two were lbw, while Gavin Hamilton lost his leg stump when looking to drive.

On the day when he opted out of Australia's tour to Zimbabwe on moral grounds, leg-spinner Stuart MacGill bowled the first over after lunch but was promptly removed after conceding nine runs.

This was during a fourth-wicket stand of 87 between Gary Pratt and Nicky Peng, who staged an impressive recovery after Durham slipped from 40 without loss to 71 for three.

Shreck had Pratt lbw the ball after reaching 50 but 21-year-old Peng continued his good start to the season by hitting 10 fours in his unbeaten 48. Peng took 16 balls to get off the mark then hit Paul Franks for three cracking fours, two of them whipped past square leg.

With rain never looking far away, Durham were put in and had no problems in the opening 45 minutes against the bowling of Shreck and Greg Smith.

Australian Marcus North, filling in until the arrival of Herschelle Gibbs, marked his home championship debut with six classy fours in his 27 off 33 balls.

Skipper Jon Lewis was also untroubled, but after cutting left-armer Smith for his third boundary the next ball surprised him by cutting in and bowling him off his pads.

In the next over, Shreck beat North's forward defensive push and won an lbw decision.

After two failures in the defeat by Hampshire, Gordon Muchall made another shaky start but looked to have settled after cutting Mark Ealham for four.

He fell for 14, however, when a ball from Franks left him to take the edge. It was a rare good ball from Franks in an erratic spell.